Catholic nonprofit opposes Arizona firing squad bill

(The Center Square) - A Catholic nonprofit has come out against an Arizona bill that would permit a firing squad to be used as an option for carrying out the death penalty.

State Sen. Kevin Payne, R-Peoria, introduced Senate Bill 1751, which would allow death row inmates to choose a firing squad as a means of execution.

SB 1751 also would require a firing squad be mandatory for people who kill Arizona law enforcement.

Payne said juries in Arizona “impose the death penalty only in the most egregious cases after lengthy trials and appeals.”

"When a lawful sentence is handed down, the state has an obligation to carry it out," he said. "These reforms make sure justice is not indefinitely delayed because of drug shortages, legal obstacles or administrative uncertainty."

For the bill to become law, the Arizona Legislature would have to pass it. Then Arizona voters would have to vote on it in the next general election on Nov. 3, 2026.

The Center Square on Tuesday contacted the office of Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes about the firing squad bill. Her spokesperson, Richie Taylor, said Mayes was not taking a position on the bill because of the attorney general's role in enforcing the death penalty.

One opponent of the bill is the Catholic Mobilizing Network, which advocates against the death penalty.

Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, the nonprofit's executive director, said America has seen “new and renewed execution methods that serve to provide alternatives to lethal injection.”

“This development comes in part due to the difficulty in procuring lethal injection drugs as pharmaceutical companies are unwilling to sell their products for state-sanctioned death,” Vaillancourt Murphy told The Center Square.

The executive director said some of these alternative methods, in addition to the firing squad, include the gas chamber and nitrogen gas asphyxiation.

Each and every execution is a blatant act of state-sanctioned violence. Each method of execution carries its own risk for error and unimaginable pain.

“It’s hard not to look at these methods and think, 'How did we get here?' " she said. "And how does our society think this inhumanity is somehow acceptable? The reality is, those are the questions we should ask ourselves each time there is an execution."

“The death penalty is contrary to human dignity and an affront to the sanctity of life," Vaillancourt Murphy told The Center Square

She added that the “system of capital punishment has become all the more deceptive to make executions appear more palatable, sterile, and ‘humane.’”

“Executions are never any of these things,” Vaillancourt Murphy noted.

Regardless of how someone is executed, the death penalty “extinguishes a God-given life with inherent dignity and worth,” the executive director noted.

“Each and every execution is a blatant act of state-sanctioned violence,” she said. "Each method of execution carries its own risk for error and unimaginable pain.”

She brought up the example of Mikal Mahdi, who was executed in 2025 in South Carolina. He went on a crime spree in 2004, killing two people. Mahdi killed an off-duty police officer in South Carolina.

As a result of this crime, Mahdi received the death penalty in South Carolina.

When Mahdi was being executed, the three-person firing squad missed Mahdi’s heart, NPR reported. Bullets caused damage to his liver and other internal organs, the outlet stated.

The bullets missing the heart caused Mahdi to have a prolonged death, according to doctors who reviewed the state’s autopsy for NPR.

Mahdi and Brad Keith Sigmon were executed by firing squad last year in South Carolina.

“This is a reminder that every execution — regardless of the method or the procedures that take place — is a violent act that disregards the dignity of life,” Vaillancourt Murphy said.

"The only way to avoid the suffering of those being executed is to stop executing people altogether," she said.

Currently in America, five states allow for the firing squad to be used as an option for the death penalty: Idaho, Mississippi, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Utah.

According to Vaillancourt Murphy, last year, 47 executions were carried out, which she said “represented a record high within the past decade.”

A Gallup poll from October 2025 showed 52% of Americans favored the death penalty, which was at its lowest level since March 1972.

“The American public is falling out of favor with the revenge-driven practice of capital punishment," Vaillancourt Murphy noted. "With our continued advocacy, we can urge elected officials and decision makers to move away from it as well."

Source: thecentersquare.com, Zachery Schmidt, February 24, 2026

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde

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